Two Minutes
by Medea Lugosi
Summary: Two minutes. 120 seconds. It's hard to believe the whole world can be thrown out of joint within such a short time. When Reno disappears during a mission, his colleagues are more deeply affected than they'd ever have expected. Will Reno's case simply be shelved like any other work-related accident or is there a lesson to be learned? (RenoxTseng)
1. 120 seconds (Prologue)

Two Minutes. More than enough time to get out. Reno chuckled cheerfully to himself, when he activated the time fuse of the bomb they had brought with them. With practiced ease he pulled his PHS from his pocket and short dialed Rude to tell them it was time to clear out.

"Yo, Rude!" he greeted casually, not waiting for his partner to answer. "You should leave now. I just started the countdown!" Even though Rude didn't say a word, Reno noticed his partner's unease immediately.

"What's wrong?" he asked, seemingly disinterested, fetching a cigarette from the almost empty pack in his pocket. No sooner had he lit it than Rude found his tongue.

"Everything alright at your end?" Reno blinked perplexedly.

"Sure," he replied. "Couldn't be better. Why are you asking?"

"Hn …" Rude hesitated and Reno was confused. Everything went well so far. And now wasn't the best time for idle talk. Not to mention that Rude wasn't one to talk much in the first place. Why start now of all times?

"One minute, thirty seconds left," Reno reminded him, taking a pull on his cigarette.

"Huh?"

"Damn it, Rude, get outta here! The thing's gonna blow!"

He heard his partner muttering a silent curse, heard him barking orders at Elena; then hurried footsteps.

"Be careful," Rude warned. "Some offices were empty. We didn't get them all."

"Yeah, sure. See you outside, partner," Reno replied, hardly worried by his words, and ended the call. The missing people might have called in sick for all they knew. No need to get all worked up about it.

A cursory glance at the timer told him that only 75 seconds remained until detonation. It was high time to evacuate the building.

Reno pocketed his PHS and turned to leave, when suddenly he felt the cool, smooth barrel of a gun pressed up against his temple. Somebody had soundlessly stepped behind him and he hadn't been wary enough to notice them in time. Well, shit. A distinct clicking sound informed him that they had released the safety catch.

So that was what Rude had warned him about. These filthy crooks had actually managed to escape his partner and had gotten cocky, most probably caught up in the delusion that they'd gained the upper hand, which made them feel safe and overly self-confident. He heaved a sigh. There was a lesson guys like them always had to learn the hard way: never underestimate a Turk. Even if they were alone.

"Hey, you!" he began coldly. "Just what exactly are you hoping to achieve with that?"

"I want you to stop the fucking timer!" the man hissed. He was very close. So close, in fact, that Reno felt his breath on the bare skin right below his ear. Reno managed to detect a hint of nervousness within his voice, although the man attempted to hide it. His hands were trembling slightly, too. He didn't stand a chance.

"Stop the fucking timer! Stop it right now!" He'd already started screaming, Reno noted with interest. 50 seconds left.

"Stop it, you son of a bitch! I won't be the only one getting blown to smithereens, if you don't get your ass in gear!"

"You don't say!" Casually Reno threw his cigarette to the floor and stubbed it out. "Unfortunately, that's not what I think. 45 seconds. I'm _terribly_ sorry."

He wasn't, really. In one single, fluent movement he grabbed the assailant's arm and threw him over his right shoulder. A shot went off, but the bullet didn't even graze him, hitting the far wall instead. Sooner than the man could even raise his head, Reno kicked him in the stomach with enough force to make him lose consciousness.

"So sorry," he repeated, smiling. "Seems you're gonna be the only one, who's getting blown to smithereens today."

A second time he glanced at the timer of the bomb. 30 seconds left. If he didn't want to prove the soon to be dead man right and let this become his final mission, it was time to scramble. Thus, he left without any further hesitation.

Running like he had the Devil on his trail, Reno reached the staircase leading down to the first floor. When his foot touched the first step, he started counting down the remaining seconds out loud: 16, 15, 14, 13, 12 … Soon he realized that he wouldn't make it to the front door, no matter how fast he ran. That left him no choice but to jump out of a window. Thankfully it wouldn't be a long fall; an estimated 13 feet at the most.

Hastily he ripped the nearest window open and climbed onto the sill. If he had counted right, there weren't but five seconds to go. Not having the time to hesitate for long, he pushed himself off, trying to jump as far away from the building as possible. His odds of survival would be slim, if he stayed too close to the bomb.

When the bomb detonated, Reno hadn't even touched the ground. The shock wave sent him flying and he felt strangely weightless, whilst bits and splinters of glass and concrete came drumming down on him like a hailstorm. Flames erupted hot and bright behind his back and then his flight came to a sudden end. As there was no way for him to break his fall, he hit the dirty road behind the building full force, only just managing to protect his head. He tasted blood and heard his PHS ring. Then his battered body simply gave up and the world before his eyes went black.

~tbc~

* * *

 **Author's Note:** This story was first published on a German site in 2010. While rewriting it, I altered a few details, but the plot is still the same, so there's really no need to re-read it, if you already know the German version. Won't be updated regularly, as I am a very busy girl. Please enjoy regardless. :-)


	2. Chapter 1

Tseng was waiting in the car. He could safely leave a routine job like this to his subordinates and thus had parked the car illegally in a no stopping zone around the corner, from where he quietly observed the building in order to catch any survivors that might have escaped his team, while he patiently waited for their return as well as their report.

The blast had diverted the local resident's attention away from them, so nobody would see them leave the scene. It was of the utmost importance that no one tied them to the supposed 'crime', because once the public came to know that Turks had been present at the scene of the explosion, they would guess that President Shinra or the Board of Directors had ordered it, and they couldn't afford a public scandal at this point in time. Strictly speaking, they never could.

The building crumbling right before Tseng's eyes was the second one they had destroyed. Four more were on the hit list. He'd put those into Reno's expert hands as well …

His thought process was interrupted when suddenly the backdoors of the car swung open and Rude got in; closely followed by a quiet and subdued Elena, who didn't show any signs of the customary adrenaline rush she used to be subject to after a job with a death toll that high. Neither of them said a word, which in Elena's case was so unusual that Tseng almost immediately came to suspect something went wrong. He eyed the empty passenger seat suspiciously, a strong sense of foreboding forming in the pit of his stomach.

"What happened?" he asked sternly. He asked, even though he strongly felt he didn't want to hear the answer. After all he was the head of the Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department and had been for a long time. He simply had to ask.

By way of answer Elena shrugged and turned away so that she didn't have to face him in the rear view mirror. Tseng was vexed with her, but opted not to show it. She still hadn't rid herself of these small and all too human insecurities, which seemed unremarkable enough at first glance, but made her vulnerable nonetheless. Letting one's emotions show was a dangerous habit, he had told her countless times. Yet she hadn't changed. It couldn't go on like that for much longer.

If he relieved her of the burden of reporting to him one last time, it was because, right at the moment, he felt unable to handle her distress. On top of that he needed a clear and structured answer, the like of which she obviously wouldn't be able to provide.

"Rude?"

Rude caught his gaze in the rear view mirror. Unlike Elena he seemed unafraid to face him, which told Tseng that he had backed the right horse. Rude's expression was completely blank though. It was always blank, with eyes invisible under the omnipresent sunglasses, yet somehow Tseng had always been able to read it. Today he couldn't even guess what he was thinking. It bothered him immensely.

"We didn't get them all," Rude calmly explained, maybe a bit too anxious to act in a professional way. " A few offices were empty when we broke in. Our whistleblower must have lied."

He fell silent thereafter, seemingly unwilling to say more.

Tseng shook his head incredulously. Even Rude couldn't bring himself to voice the obvious and tried to fob him off with irrelevant facts, in spite of knowing full well that it didn't matter if a few unimportant goons escaped – their organization was doomed anyway. Should they tell their leader that Shinra was hard on their heels, it wouldn't be news to him. He had to be well aware he didn't stand a chance to save his fat ass anymore. No, that wasn't really the issue here. But Tseng assumed that even Rude wouldn't get to the point any time soon, if he didn't address the elephant in the room himself …

"Very well then." He took a deep breath to brace himself for the inevitable, strongly disapproving of the way his fingers were slowly growing numb. He was their leader, after all. He couldn't afford to lose his cool over something like _that_. It didn't matter, really. Just a small stain on an otherwise perfect picture. And yet his breast constricted strangely and he felt like he couldn't breathe very well when he continued:

"Tell me all you know, Rude. You lost Reno. What the fuck happened in there?"

Rude couldn't hold his gaze any longer and looked away.

"We know close to nothing," he truthfully explained. "Reno called me right after he started the countdown. I told him to keep an eye out for survivors, but he seemed to believe he was safe. He just said … He said …" Rude broke off, unsure whether he should repeat the words. It would hurt. But in the end he decided to follow through with it. They might have been the last words Reno had ever spoken.

"See you outside, partner."

The memory brought a somewhat crooked smile to his face. The choice of words was typical of Reno. Always sporting the same laid back attitude.

"We waited for as long as we could", Rude concluded. "He didn't leave the building."

Tseng felt as though he was dreaming. His body seemed to be enveloped in cotton wool. There it was. Rude had given it; the answer he had dreaded and craved at the same time. Somehow he didn't find the strength to actually reply, so he started driving in silence. It was high time to leave the crime scene, lest someone saw them and started asking inconvenient questions. With or without Reno – the job had to be done.

They had almost reached the Shinra Building when Elena couldn't take the deafening silence anymore.

"Damn it, Tseng!" Her voice was shaking. "Why?"

"Why what?" He had to make an effort not to snap at her, and still he sounded a lot colder than he had intended to. She looked so helplessly lost, it drove him mad. He honestly tried to fight the anger, but couldn't suppress it entirely.

"Why didn't we look for him, at the very least? After the blast, I called him and his PHS reacted! Do you understand? It isn't broken! It would've been blown to smithereens, had he still been in the building when the bomb went off! Tseng!"

She was outright accusing him of having misjudged the situation now, Tseng noted. Women tended to do that whenever they felt like throwing a fit. He had been with Elena's older sister long enough to know. And if he couldn't be bothered to treat her with patience back then, he couldn't be bothered know.

"Listen, girl," he retorted sharply, "neither of you saw Reno leave. Whatever happened to his PHS, he's dead and nothing you say will change that. It was a regrettable accident, but I can't do anything about it. And before you even bother asking: no, we can't go looking for his corpse either. I wouldn't be wise to linger."

"O, to hell with it!" she mumbled, nervously biting her knuckles. "Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

Rude grabbed her hand and forcefully removed it from her mouth.

They didn't speak again until they reached the Shinra Building, which still resembled a construction site. There was nothing left to say. Tomorrow at the latest they would be compelled to talk about the mission and report to Rufus Shinra. For today, though, they would call it quits. It had been a long time ago that they had last lost one of their own and Tseng was appalled at just how hard it hit them. That was deeply unsettling. Had they really gotten that much closer these last few years? Closer than what was still acceptable? In their line of work getting attached was the epitome of a bad idea.

"You should go home now," he advised when he stopped in front of the Shinra Building to drop both Rude and Elena off. "Tomorrow we'll give our report. Consider carefully what needs to be said."

Elena didn't seem to listen. She was leaning on Rude rather than standing on her own, and once again Tseng cursed her silently for being so emotional. At the same time he could feel Rude staring intently at him, even when he started up the engine once again and drove off. He knew perfectly well what Rude was thinking, although he didn't want to face up to it just yet.

~tbc~

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Would you prefer longer chapters to the short ones I've been posting? I don't really mind ... Anyway: thanks for reading. I do hope it was worth your while.


	3. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:**

 _This is a flashback._

This is the present.

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

When Tseng arrived home, he was suffering from a splitting headache. The huge and nondescript apartment complex seemed dull and dead and impersonal like it never had before. He had chosen to live here out of his own free will, but, this evening, the grave-like silence made him sick. He felt like he was floating up the stairs, unable to truly get in touch with his body. He recognized the symptoms all too well and decided to drown himself in alcohol in order to prevent the emptiness from taking over, all the while refusing to acknowledge what had happened.

Closing the door behind him, he refrained from turning on the lights and unceremoniously dropped his jacket to the ground. First he entered the kitchen to grab a glass with deadened fingers and filled it to the brim with rum. He then proceeded to swallow an indistinct number of painkillers, washing them down with the contents of the glass. When that didn't make him feel any better, he resolved on discarding the glass. With the bottle in one hand and a pack of cigarettes in the other, he made his way to the bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed. The curtains weren't drawn and the signs of the numerous bars across the street filled the room with neon light, throwing bizarre shadows on the far wall. The room was neat and tidy like it always was. The bed, however, was unmade. The bed … He had left it in a hurry hours before dawn.

 _They_ had left it.

Tseng allowed himself to drop back and inhaled the scent that lingered old and strong within the sheets. Suddenly he felt nauseous. He made it to the bathroom just in time, narrowly avoiding vomiting all over the floor.

It seemed like an eternity had passed, when finally his stomach calmed down enough for him to get up again. Dizzily, he rinsed his mouth and staggered back to the bedroom. His head still hurt like hell and he reached for the painkillers without really noticing, taking another three and washing them down with rum once again. He needed to get drunk tonight. Drunk enough to actually lose the ability to think, and drunk enough to fight the emptiness that was trying to take hold of him. If he threw up again, he would just start over.

In between the rum, the painkillers and cigarettes, Tseng idly wondered when he had become that unprofessional. He didn't have his thoughts under control, not to mention his feelings. He felt hollow, as though someone had pulled his guts out and left nothing but a deep and empty hole behind; a gaping, dark abyss that he was on the brink of tumbling into. What would await him on the ground, he could only guess. Madness, he assumed. He couldn't afford to lose his mind though. People depended on him. On top of that, he simply refused to give in to sentimental crap like that. He had always functioned perfectly. Never would he have dreamed that something as trivial as a work-related accident would suffice to throw him off balance. Otherwise, he would have called a halt before it was too late.

Work-related accident. He laughed humorlessly. That was all there was to it. Gaia knew, you didn't have to worry about pensions in his line of work. It was his job to kill or be killed and he really should have expected that, someday, one of his subordinates would get the worst of it, yet it had taken him completely by surprise …

* * *

 _Tseng heard the footsteps on the stairs long before the door swung open. He would always recognize him by his walk, had heard him ascending these stairs far too often to remain ignorant._

 _There was a quiet rustling of cloths when he stood up to glance at the wall clock above the kitchen door. Half past two am. He hadn't realized how late it had gotten. Shortly past midnight he had left his office, brewed himself a cup of coffee, and settled down at the kitchen table to read today's paper. In the end, he hadn't been able to concentrate._

 _Tseng suppressed a yawn and put his cup into the sink, intending to wait in the hallway for the key to turn in the lock. He hadn't expected Reno to come over tonight, but wasn't surprised either. They never arranged to meet but rather saw each other arbitrarily, often just in passing, and that wouldn't change anytime soon. After all, they weren't in a relationship. They could both do without the cheesy clichés._

 _Yet Reno was the only one allowed a spare key to his apartment; the only one allowed to stay there when Tseng wasn't home. What was between them could best be described as a kind of pleasant symbiosis._

 _Reno didn't turn on the light when he entered the apartment._ _In spite of that,_ _he didn't have to look around to be aware of Tseng, who was standing in the shadows, casually leaning against the opposite wall. Reno couldn't actually see him, of course, seeing that the hallway he had come from was well lit and his eyes needed time to adjust to the darkness inside, but he knew instinctively. It was a matter of work experience. Tseng secretly smiled to himself. Work experience. You couldn't afford night blindness in their line of work, unless you were content to end up as cannon fodder._

" _Hi, boss!" Reno wasn't drunk, he could discern that from the way he talked. How strange. Normally, he would be plastered when coming home late at night after a job. He did carry a bottle of beer though. "Still awake that late at night, huh?"_

 _Thoughtlessly, he pulled his shoes off his feet and dropped them right where he was standing. He took off his jacket as well and flicked it over his shoulder, all the while steadily approaching Tseng._

 _Tseng pretended not to notice._

" _Did things go well today?" he asked instead. "Since you're here, you might just as well give your report."_

" _Tseng, Tseng, Tseng," Reno reprimanded him with a smirk that was impossible to read. "You're downright incapable of not working, aren't you_ _?"_

" _You are one to talk," Tseng deadpanned. He'd buried his hands in his pockets without realizing, as though he wanted to keep himself from touching Reno who was close now. Close enough, in fact, for Tseng to feel his breath in the crook of his neck. Reno had placed a hand against the wall, right next to his right cheek, and he felt strangely trapped. He always did. The close proximity was giving him goosebumps and for some reason he felt like he should at least try to fight the almost electric tension he knew so well. Secretly he wondered why. He had long since surrendered after all._

 _Reno chuckled cheerily and drank the remainder of his beer in one go._

 _"Someday you'll need to learn how to relax, you stuffy old man", he reproached him with a smirk, but it wasn't all good-natured. He put down the empty bottle quite carefully and well away from where one of them might accidentally step on it. It seemed uncharacteristic of Reno and made Tseng wonder if something had gone awry. If so, then Reno really needed to report back to him before they did anything else. When he told him, Reno's face fell. He became strangely serious and Tseng realized that he had misjudged the situation._

" _You can't be anything but perfect these days," Reno said in a low voice. "It's driving me insane."_

 _He leaned forward, gently stroking back Tseng's hair, and placed an almost chaste kiss right below his earlobe. Instantly a shiver ran down Tseng's spine and his hands started trembling ever so slightly as though he were afraid of the kinds of kisses that were yet to come. He wasn't afraid though; just overworked. Still he turned his head away as a precaution._

" _Your report," he gently reminded Reno, before he was too far gone to think of it._

 _Reno sighed exasperatedly, but couldn't be diverted from sliding a hand below his shirt and teasingly caressing the sensitive skin on his back, right below his shoulder blades. For a moment, Tseng forgot how to breathe._

" _Now?" Reno asked reluctantly, even though he knew full well that he wouldn't be able to get out of giving his report._

 _Tseng nodded, struggling to hide how close he was to compromising his principles, due to the fact that, right at this moment, he really couldn't care less about the mission. Right then he realized just how much he had unconsciously longed for Reno to come over. If he was honest with himself, that might have been the only reason why he had stayed up late. It wasn't like him, however, to give in to base instincts like the one telling him that fucking Reno senseless here and now was a better idea than insisting on the damn report._

" _Number five is due tomorrow morning, five am. That's your job. I have to know if all preparations are completed. I'm not really keen on scratching pieces of you off the streets tomorrow, just because you didn't deem it necessary to report back to your boss when he asked you to."_

 _With another sigh, Reno pulled back his hand and calmly started unbuttoning Tseng's shirt, seemingly unaffected by his relentless insistence. "Don't sweat it, everything's ok," he said, his face devoid of all expression, and at the same time expertly removed Tseng's shirt._

" _We shot the accountants. Both were in the office as predicted and we found the blueprints as well as all the important documents. There shouldn't be any problems tomorrow. They can't afford to disappear, even if they know we're gonna annihilate them if they don't. We're gonna get them all; we always have. It's really no big deal, boss. None of us is going to kick the bucket that easily."_

 _His hands had developed a life of their own; restlessly caressing and exploring Tseng's upper body. Still Tseng pretended to ignore his advances, freed himself from his grasp and picked up his shirt_ _ _unnecessarily_ , before worlessly disappearing into his bedroom. _

_The signs of the numerous bars across the street filled the room with neon light, throwing bizarre shadows on the far wall. In passing, Tseng looked out of the window. Midgar wasn't sleeping, and neither would they. Nights like this just weren't meant for sleeping. Over the course of time, the job had become routine, and yet it regularly stretched them to their limits. Sometimes it was essential to forget what they were about to do. Sometimes it was essential to distract oneself._

 _Right on cue, Reno wrapped his arms around him and, impatiently, started toying with his waistband. As expected, he had followed him. They were long since about to become routine too. Just like the job._

" _You went for a drink with Rude?" It wasn't really a question and Tseng wasn't really interested in the answer, though he was slightly curious as to why he smelled so little alcohol on Reno's breath today. That was unusual. Normally he would be smashed after an evening out with his partner._

" _Yah, sure," was the rather unsurprising answer. "I can't just go and bump off those dickheads, wipe the blood off my shoes, go home and lie down in my fucking bed."_

" _That's why you come to me."_

 _A smug smile adorned Tseng's lips as he turned around and gripped him tightly by the neck to force an almost savage kiss on him, which Reno reciprocated gladly once the initial shock had passed._

~tbc~


	4. Chapter 3

_From then on, time passed in a blur. It did Tseng a world of good to feel Reno's naked skin beneath his fingers, heated and gleaming with sweat. So when it was over, a few long seconds passed, during which they didn't separate, quietly listening to each other's gasping breaths and slowly decelerating heartbeats and drinking in the lingering heat as though the experience were new to them. Rarely did Tseng feel so perfectly alive and strangely detached from reality at the same time. He had to let go of Reno in order to recover his senses._

" _Fuck!" Reno commented wittily. His voice was still trembling ever so slightly. "I'm done. I'm totally exhausted. You're draining me, Boss …"His arms were wide spread, and yet they didn't touch. It was no longer necessary. They didn't even look at each other, incidentally facing opposite walls._

 _Suspiciously unfocused, Tseng reached for the alarm clock on the nightstand. 0400 hours. There wasn't much time left._

" _Damn it, Tseng!" He hadn't noticed Reno sitting up and leaning towards him._

" _Hm?" he inquired into the sudden outburst with obvious disinterest. The answer came in the form of a resigned sigh and a theatrical rolling of the eyes._

" _Is that all you can think of? 'Hm'?! – Oh, man! What did I even expect? After all, Mr. Frost's got a reputation to lose."_

 _Confused, Tseng raised his head to face him. Reno just turned away, forcing him to communicate with nothing but his naked back. Tseng opened his mouth only to shut it again almost immediately without having uttered a single word. He couldn't think of anything. It wasn't quite the reaction he had expected. He had no clue what to make of it, and that made him feel somewhat uneasy._

" _Reno," he tried again, but didn't get to finish, because, right at that moment, a PHS started ringing. He supposed it was his, as Reno was usually hard to get a hold of after hours and certainly wouldn't have refrained from turning off his PHS. It was a bad habit Tseng never ceased complaining about. Right then, however, he wasn't the least bit annoyed. That call was an all too welcome distraction from Reno's unexplainable temper tantrum._

 _Relieved, he picked up his trousers from the floor and pulled his PHS from his pocket. The caller ID informed him that it was Elena. When he took the call, she started talking without even giving him a chance to get a word in._

" _Please excuse the interruption, boss," she said politely, just like her parents must have taught her when she was still a little girl. "We just wanted to know if the mission's been rescheduled. It's almost half past five now. Should we still wait for you?"_

 _In the blink of an eye, Tseng was wide awake. A quick glance at the alarm clock proved that they were indeed late and had kept Rude and Elena waiting at the headquarters. Losing track of time like that was inexcusable, but if they left immediately, the delay would still be within limits. There was no time to be wasted._

" _Boss?"_

" _No, it hasn't been rescheduled," he replied, silently reprimanding himself for his unprecedented forgetfulness. "I'll be there in a couple of minutes. Reno will be with me."_

" _Understood," Elena replied in a carefully neutral tone of voice. She was too much of a slave to authority to reproach her boss, even though she had to be well aware of what had transpired. He'd made sure she knew exactly what was going on between Reno and him months ago to crush her hopes of ever becoming his lover as brutally as possible. Knowing her sister, whom he had at some point dubbed the Queen of Bitch Fits, he'd never felt inclined to try it on with her. Elena might have been less bitchy than her older sister, but she sported a colorful variety of other shortcomings of which her unbearable emotionalism wasn't even the worst. On top of that they had to function as a team without a hitch, and he didn't doubt for a second that it would have affected her performance had he ever touched her. These thoughts in mind, he ended the call without saying another word and slid his PHS back into his pocket._

 _While Tseng was talking on the phone, Reno had taken a seat on the very edge of the bed and lit a cigarette. For a moment, Tseng froze mid-movement and studied him quietly. He was very calm, completely motionless; a few strands of his long, red hair were waving in a soft breeze, the source of which Tseng couldn't discern. It was of no importance anyway. They had to leave. They had to leave the peaceful air of the apartment to go and do their job, which, in this case, meant killing more than a hundred people all at once._

 _These last few missions were in a class of their own, suited to push even a Turk to their limit. And once this day was over, they would have to repeat the same horrendous act of violence four more times._

 _Unaware of Tseng's silent aversion to trade the current peace for yet more bloodshed, Reno started humming a tune in a voice so low that it was hard to recognize._

" _When you think it's all said and done … Bow down, surrender unto me, submit infectiously, sanctify your demons … you don't exist, cannot resist, the Judas kiss … When you are the ostracized, selfish ridden dead goodbyes … when the pieces never fit …"_

 _Tseng smiled as he identified the song as one that regularly played in the bar they frequented after hours. He would have commented on it, had it not been high time to leave._

* * *

 _XXX_

* * *

"Bow down, surrender unto me, submit infectiously, sanctify your demons … you don't exist, cannot resist, the Judas kiss …"

Reno's voice reverberated cold and hollow from the clean, even sterile walls, and kept the silence from getting the upper hand. Forming the words wasn't easy, due to the fact that his lips were swollen and covered in blood that was already clotting. He loathed the taste, but couldn't do anything about it.

His hands were tied behind his back, but he couldn't feel the bonds. He had as much feeling in his fingers as in his arms and legs: none at all. And while that didn't actually surprise him – it couldn't be particularly good for your health to be taught how to fly by the shockwave of a major explosion – he couldn't be expected to be overly enthusiastic about it.

Idly he wondered whether the others took him for dead.

Reno was sure they did. It would be downright preposterous to hope for someone to go and look for him. Not even he knew where he was, nor who had picked him up and brought him here. There were but two things he knew for sure: He wasn't with Shinra, and whoever had abducted him needed him alive. Apparently, they went to the trouble of cleaning and dressing his wounds as well as removing the splinters of glass and asphalt from his body.

Did they intend to hold him hostage in order to use him as leverage against Shinra? No, certainly not. Who would ever be so stupid as to believe that Shinra cared about the wellbeing of their employees? They were all replaceable. All of them. Without exception.

He wanted to laugh, but found himself unable to produce the sound, choking on his own blood halfway through. He was likely to die here sooner or later, and if he died, it would be his own fault. He should have heeded Rude's advice and kept an eye out for survivors.

Reno had always known that his recklessness would someday be his downfall, but he hadn't expected it to happen so soon. Missions were the only thing that ever went well in his life and he hadn't worried all that much that this might change. It had happened now, however, and he had to cope with it. He didn't plan on giving up. Not himself and none of the people, things and information he had access to. Even though he was realist enough to see that the odds weren't exactly in his favor.

He was in bad shape and couldn't count on receiving any backup. In all the years he had been working for _Shinra Electric Power Company_ , he had come to know how a case like his was usually handled. There was no evidence that he had died in the explosion, but neither was there any evidence suggesting he was still alive. To save time and effort, nobody would bother looking into the matter. It was, by far, more profitable to just shelve the case and label him KIA. Nothing more could he expect. And yet he caught himself foolishly hoping not to be forsaken. Rude, Tseng, Elena … He really would appreciate it, if they came for him. But for all that, he was fully aware that it was impossible.

Somewhere in the semidarkness, a door swung open and heavy, steady footsteps could be heard. Reno was unable to see who had entered the room. He was seated on an uncomfortable plastic folding chair facing the wall. That was of no concern to him though. It hardly mattered who had brought him here, for he knew he wasn't in for a children's birthday party, and if they thought they could intimidate him by literally leaving him in the dark about the circumstances of his capture, they were sadly mistaken. He would be a lousy Turk if he hadn't banished the thing called "fear" from his mind years ago.

Reno tilted his head back nonchalantly and pushed the omnipresent pain to the back of his mind. He couldn't afford to show any weakness. That would make him vulnerable, and being vulnerable was a mistake he had to avoid at all costs, lest he wanted to put his colleague's lives at risk. He didn't want to end up as a … systemic error.

"When you think it's all said and done, when you are the ostracized, selfish ridden dead goodbyes … So what now? Where go I? When you think it's all said and done …"

The song helped him stop thinking, which was exactly what he needed now.

~tbc~

* * *

 **A/N:** The song is "The Judas Kiss" by Metallica. And as you might have noticed, I don't write anything explicit, because I just _can't_. Forgive me if I disappointed you ... At least we know now what happened to Reno. See you next chapter! Or so I hope ... ;-)


	5. Chapter 4

**A/N:** Dear readers, this is a rather short chapter and for that, I want to apologize. I don't have much free time this summer and don't get to write as much as I'd like to. Please forgive me and enjoy, despite the brevity. Next time, there will be another flashback ...

* * *

XXX

* * *

Lost in thoughts, Elena toyed with the disgustingly lemon yellow straw, with which the barkeeper had desecrated her _Midgar Sunrise_. She wasn't in the mood to surround herself with colors, really, but she couldn't bring herself to complain about it either. She simply lacked the necessary energy. Sitting next to her, Rude kept his silence, and even though she was well aware that expecting him of all people to rid her of that wretched feeling of complete and utter helplessness was nothing short of egoistic, that was exactly what she hoped for. Her mind was filled to the brim with a fetid swamp of prematurely withered thoughts, the most unpleasant of which were swimming on the surface like grease drops and stubbornly refusing to sink in.

"Why didn't we just go home?" she asked without even sparing a glance for Rude. It was another one of the innumerable, fruitless attempts to strike up a conversation with him, the likes of which she repeated time and again in order to avoid drowning in the all-encompassing silence. Or so she thought. She'd never have dreamed that he would actually reply and almost dropped her glass from shock when – contrary to expectation – he deigned to answer.

"I couldn't let you wander off on your own after what's happened," he explained curtly. It was the choice of words which made her see red immediately without really noticing. Old fears and rejections of the past came crawling from the inky blackness of her mental swamp, sticking to her like a second skin.

"You don't have to say anything else; I understand perfectly well," she hissed, her cheeks aglow with spontaneous, uncontrolled rage. "I'm just Laney; poor stupid, little Laney. The new one. The _unprofessional_ one. Excuse me for caring when my friends get blown to pieces!"

For a moment, her hands clenched up painfully. Then her rage subsided just as fast as it had appeared. Without the anger fuelled energy to hold her upright, she deflated, burying her head in her hands resignedly.

"I'm sorry … Please, forgive me … It's just … I …" She didn't quite know what to say.

Rude examined her with interest.

"You're afraid of Tseng," he diagnosed matter-of-factly. "You're afraid of his verdict. Even now?" He sighed. For a long time now, nobody had complained about her and her little insecurities, and yet the conflict seemed to be merrily bubbling away within her. She hadn't been with the Turks for as long as the others, but she knew well enough what she was doing. If she didn't, she wouldn't have survived this long. Didn't she realize that she was, in fact, respected?

She was nervous, even now.

"I don't know," Elena replied hesitantly, restlessly toying with a strand of corn blond hair. "Afraid of his verdict, maybe. He's so damn cold. Just like he doesn't understand …"

Rude turned his gaze away from her and remained silent for a while.

"I think he doesn't want to understand," he said eventually. Tseng didn't want to admit to himself that even he hadn't managed to become completely unfeeling. Admitting that much would render him vulnerable, and while Rude didn't know much about his past, he had heard enough to know that _vulnerable_ was the last thing Tseng wanted to become. He wouldn't make any inquiries, stamp "KIA" in big red letters onto Reno's file and bury it in a drawer. After all, no room for last hopes meant no room for disappointment. In any other case, Rude might have done the exact same thing, but as much as he respected Tseng, he couldn't possibly abandon his own partner, just because his boss ordered him not to look into his disappearance out of some misguided form of self-protection.

Elena had a point: Most likely, it would have been impossible to get through to Reno's PHS if he had still been in the building at the time of the explosion. What ripped human bodies apart surely didn't stop at electrical devices. Tseng should have taken that into account. As head of the department, he bore responsibility for his staff and had to be informed about their whereabouts.

He doubted whether Rufus Shinra would be satisfied with the report they would be forced to give in the morning, but Tseng changing his mind was even less likely, given the state he was in. He was practicing the most distinguished art of suppression – probably even with success. He couldn't possibly take an interest in investigating this so-called "work-related accident".

Idly, Rude wondered if Tseng would have acted as irrational and unreasonable had Reno's fate befallen someone else.

He couldn't be a hundred percent sure, of course, but he assumed that losing any of his closest colleagues would have a profound impact, even on Tseng. Losing his Second in Command, though, was in a class of its own.

Tseng most likely hadn't been prepared for death and calamities hitting so close to home. In all likelihood, he had survived too much to not indulge in a treacherous believe in immortality. Tseng's past hadn't been a happy one. He had seen and heard and felt, in short lived through a lot more than a single human being could normally endure, and, as a reaction, had hidden himself away behind an iron mask of indifference in order to feign an invulnerability that was ultimately unattainable.

Maybe, Rude thought, Tseng had forgotten how very human he still was over the course of time. And maybe he hadn't, and that was why he disapproved of Elena's emotionality so much. In the end, pondering that question was nothing he should waste time on. It simply wasn't his business.

What happened to Reno, however, was his business. They had worked together for too long to simply leave him to his fate. They were partners; even friends. Until his death was proved beyond any reasonable doubt, he wouldn't give up on him. He owed him that much. And if Tseng was incapable of dealing with this particular case, he would just have to do it himself. Even against Tseng's orders, if need be. He could certainly count on Elena's support.

They remained silent, each dwelling on their own thoughts, until their glasses were almost empty and Elena's lemon yellow straw was all tattered and torn. Then life returned to her.

"I feel so sorry for him", she said out of the blue, and it was clear that she was talking about Tseng. Just as if she had somehow tuned into Rude's thoughts.

It was a sentiment he didn't really share. With a nod, he acknowledged her statement anyway.

"What's he gonna do?"

"…"

Asking wouldn't have been necessary, and Rude concluded that it was equally unnecessary to answer. Elena took an almost hesitant sip of her _Midgar Sunrise_ , turned around to look at him and then, all of a sudden, violently shook her head.

"That's unbelievable! Unbelievable!" she repeated the word like a mantra. "I can't believe that he actually expects us to sit still and twiddle our thumbs like nothing ever happened, while Reno very likely needs our help! Don't say it, Rude, I don't want to hear it. I'm not tough enough, the job's too much for me to handle, blah, blah, blah! At least I still got a heart beating in my chest instead of a crypt! I'd never have thought I'd say this, but Tseng behaves like an unfeeling ass! 'Tomorrow we'll give our report. Consider carefully what needs to be said,'" she mimicked him. "And that's it? Don't you _dare_ say it, Rude!"

Rude wouldn't have dreamed of saying anything. She had talked herself into a fury by now, and it would be impossible to get through to her. Besides, she was right.

"There might be no proof of Reno surviving the explosion," she continued. "But neither is there any proof of death. Damn it! Damn _him_! Tseng's supposed to investigate into that! He isn't usually like that! Hasn't he always been meticulous and freaking prissy up until now? Why? Why now? Does he honestly think this is the right time to overturn his working morale and to _not_ do his job properly? I honestly feel like shooting him! Shit! What _is_ he thinking? Playing the boss-card to shut us up. If Rufus doesn't call him off the case tomorrow, I really don't know what I'm gonna do!"

She took a deep breath to calm down and keep herself from saying things she would later regret. Hadn't she just claimed to feel sorry for Tseng? She couldn't let herself go like that. Baseless accusations wouldn't get her anywhere, and she didn't have time to spare for a standstill – as rewarding as it might seem at first glance to seek fault with others.

Rude didn't take Elena home. He didn't even wait for her to leave the bar, before he set off. It wasn't the night to be a gentleman, and even if had been, he wouldn't have acted upon it. They were all strung up, without exception. He secretly doubted that any one of them could muster up the strength necessary to support the others and get them back on their feet. Not given these circumstances.

The circumstances. What exactly were the circumstances? Primarily unclear and in dire need of clarification. Rude had always perceived Reno as some kind of walking calamity – at least in the early days of their collaboration. Who would have thought that his disappearance, of all things, would plunge the clear and well-defined structures according to which the Turks lived and worked into chaos?

If he was assessing the situation correctly, he was the only one still in their right mind by now, and, because of that, had to take things into his own hands, if he wanted something to get done.

It was a cool and starry night. Rude couldn't tell how late it was, but was sure that it was too late to go home and get some shut-eye. It would be best to head straight for the office and await the break of dawn there. Maybe he could achieve something by reviewing the files concerning their last few missions and the organization they were expected to take down. And even if he didn't achieve anything, it was still a better way to pass his time than looking for persons responsible where there weren't any.

His feet carried him to the headquarters without his mind taking any conscious part in the action. How often had he walked this path? He smiled.

Less than 24 hours ago, he had walked this same path with Reno. It might have been the last time. Who would have thought …?

~tbc~


	6. Chapter 5

" _Oi, Rude!_

 _He raised his head to dart a questioning glance at his partner. Reno was sitting propped up against the wall, smoking a cigarette. He smoked a hell of a lot of cigarettes these days; a lot more than he used to. Rude was certain there was something wrong with him, but had decided not to pry. It was most probably a private matter._

" _For how long are we supposed to waste or time here waiting? It sucks!"_

 _Rude sighed. "Don't complain. That's your job," he explained in a tone of voice reminiscent of a mother chastising her child, although said mother likely had better chances for success._

" _Tche, job!" he replied ungraciously, supporting his words with a dismissive gesture. "That's bullshit. Why don't we just go in there and get the stuff. It's gotten damn fucking late. Almost half past two. If their lunch break isn't over yet, they've most likely eaten themselves to death."_

 _Rude didn't answer. Reno knew full well that mere assumptions were no sound basis to take action. They had to wait until both accountants returned to their shared office – the second of which hadn't shown his face all day. That much for lunch break._

 _Currently, the Turks were lurking in a dark corner opposite a rather modern apartment complex. Most of the apartments were rented out to private persons, but not all of them. A corner apartment on the 4_ _th_ _floor was what they paid special attention to. It was one of the secret offices the organization had spread over the city to make it harder for investigators to discover all their records. Of course, that wasn't enough to put the Turks off their trail._

 _They had done jobs like this before: Enter the apartment/office, kill the henchmen on site and secure all important documents. Before they dealt the final blow, it was absolutely necessary to eliminate the personal on the 4_ _th_ _floor as well, and seize whatever valuable information they could find. In short, their mission entailed housebreaking, theft, and double murder._

 _Ever since Shinra got on to the trail of the organization, they had to get their hands dirty time and again. Rude assumed that more people had died by their hands during the last seven days than ever before. It was meant to be a warning for all those who were foolish enough to try and take on Shinra. Rude couldn't tell whether or not the others were having a hard time coping with the unprecedented death toll, but he himself had almost shied away from the task. An order was an order, though. There was no point in pondering the pros and cons._

" _Oi, Rude!"_

 _Reno grabbed his shoulder and shook him with enough force to pull him from his thoughts. With his free hand, he was pointing at a fat, unsightly guy crossing the street not far from where they were hiding. The second accountant._

" _There he is! Finally! He kept us waiting for freaking ever, that damn bastard!"_

" _Hn," Rude agreed wholeheartedly. Now that the wait had come to an end, it was time to get down to work._

 _Not hesitating any further, they left the dingy back street that had served them as a hideout all morning, and followed the man, carefully concealing themselves in the shadows._

" _I don't think he's planning to stay long", Reno observed with one of those smug grins that were so typical of him. Something was off about it, though. Rude could have sworn it was fake. "Not if there's an ounce of reason left in him."_

 _Kicking in the door wasn't difficult at all. Until now, the organization had obviously counted on their offices to remain secret, and that would have been an all right long-term strategy if it hadn't been for the Turks closing in on them. Not trying too hard to safeguard the secret offices meant not to draw attention to them. But, unlike the average rival gang, the Turks couldn't be kept at bay for long by a simple game of hide and seek._

 _With well-aimed blows, Rude took out both accountants in an instant. They didn't even have the time to scream or put up a fight. Not that they were in any kind of fighting shape, anyway. As soon as they went down, Rude joined his partner in sifting through the desk drawers and filing cabinets._

" _Poor bastards," Reno commented on the still forms on the ground, shoving a few loose documents inside a briefcase they had brought with them, but it was obvious that he didn't truly pity them. "I wonder why they even came here in the first place. They must have known that, sooner or later, we'd show up." He pondered on it for a moment, then simply shrugged it off. "Oh, well. 's not like they had much of an alternative."_

 _And he was right. Every last member of the organization was bound to know that they were in some deep shit, but there really was nowhere to run. Even if they were to flee the country, they would still be well inside Shinra's reach, and going underground wasn't an option either, for the shadows and the slums were where Shinra's bloodhounds hunted best. They had to fight back. And in order to fight back it was imperative to keep their infrastructure working for as long as possible, even if it meant sacrificing a shitload of employees._

 _Once they had searched the last cabinet, Reno placed the briefcase on top of a writing desk._

"' _s that all?" he asked with a strangely weary look in his eyes._

 _By way of response, Rude gave a curt nod. Within minutes, they'd discovered all the files and documents that they had hoped to find and pocketed everything that could be of use to them later on. There remained just one more thing to do …_

" _Alrighty!" Reno exclaimed, sounding less enthusiastic than he had probably meant to. "That leaves the dirty work."_

 _Having said that, he pulled a gun from the shoulder holster hidden underneath his suit jacket. It was nothing special. In Midgar's darkest corners, small calibers like that were used by the thousands, which was why it would be hard for anyone outside the organization to trace the weapon back to Shinra and the Turks. Reno looked at it with obvious disdain._

" _I hate that thing. It's not my style," he said and, thus, caused Rude to muse about how rarely he had seen his partner wield a gun out in the field. These days, he always carried it with him, alongside his weapon of choice. It was the electric rod that usually stayed hidden now, though._

 _Sometimes, it was weird to see how expertly Reno handled the unfamiliar tool, despite his strong dislike. It didn't take him longer than a second to take aim and pull the trigger. The bullet hit one of the accountants in the head and painted a sticky red halo on the ground._

 _A shrill and panicked scream drew the Turk's attention to the second man, who had woken up much sooner than expected and struggled to get to his feet, his gaze fixed on his colleague's disfigured corpse. He seemed to have a better constitution than the other man, but while that might have been to his advantage in any other situation, now it proved to be a curse._

" _Shut the fuck up, dude!" Reno yelled and aimed at him. Appalled and horrified at the sight of a weapon pointed right at him, the accountant tried to back away, but collided with a wall mere seconds later. His chubby face was pale and covered in sweat and his knees were trembling. Soon his strength would fail him. Soon he would collapse._

" _N-no, please, don't," he stammered in an attempt to save his life that was as desperate as it was futile. "Please! My children, my wife – I love her – Please, don't – I lo-"_

 _In the blink of an eye, Reno's face darkened. The look in his eyes was so cold and so devoid of mercy that it startled even Rude. There was hate in his eyes when there should have been nothing but professional indifference. And when he shot the man, he didn't pull the trigger once, but five times, emptying the magazine into the shaking body of the unfortunate accountant._

 _Five shots cracked in rapid succession and turned the room into a slaughterhouse. The body didn't drop until the last shot hit it in the chest, and when, eventually, it did, it left a trail of blood and … other things on the wall._

 _Only then did Reno lower his gun. Even though he had not in any way overexerted himself that day, his hands were trembling and he was_ _breathing hard_ _._

 _Rude couldn't fathom what had gotten into him, but now wasn't exactly the best time to worry about things like that. They had to leave immediately. Every last soul in the building must have heard the scream and shots and it wouldn't be long before somebody mustered up the courage to come and see what was going on. Shooting down the whole apartment complex was hardly an option, so he hurriedly grabbed Reno by the sleeve and dragged him outside into the hallway, down the stairs, and out of the building._

 _Somehow, they managed to escape unseen before the whole neighborhood gathered around, yet none of the hate and rage left Reno's eyes until much later, when they reached the car and couldn't see the building anymore. From that point on, he just looked tired and pale and outright sick, so that Rude couldn't help but worry a little about him. Something was definitely wrong._

" _Look, man, I'm sorry." It was rare for Reno to apologize, so these words only added to Rude's feeling of unease. "I know how it is. That could've gone horribly wrong. I don't know what I was thinking …"_

 _In fact, he probably hadn't been thinking at all._

 _Rude laid a hand on his shoulder._

" _Let's go for a drink," he suggested, allowing them to fall back into their usual routine as though nothing had happened. Reno nodded in agreement, albeit somewhat dejectedly._

* * *

 _XXX_

* * *

Shaking his head resignedly, Rude entered the headquarters and called the elevator. Maybe he should have asked after all. Whatever the reason for Reno's sudden change in behavior – they must have been important. And now that he had vanished from their lives so suddenly, Rude felt he should at least have tried to talk to him. He felt as if he had failed to fulfill his duty both as a partner and a friend.

He wondered if the others had realized something was amiss. Probably not. And even if they had, it didn't matter anymore. Whatever had been driving Reno to react so aggressively to the accountant's words the day before certainly wasn't connected to his disappearance. Maybe, Rude thought, he would ask Reno what it was once he had found him. _If_ he ever found him, that was, and _if_ there was anything of Reno left to find.

He didn't actually believe Reno was dead, but if he had survived the detonation, he was most likely in grave danger. Something was keeping him from coming back or at least contacting one of them. Maybe he had been hit by the debris of the crumbling building and died at the scene. In that case, his PHS could still be working, even though he hadn't made it out of there alive.

Still, these thoughts were nothing but speculations.

Rude knew he'd have to return to the crime scene if he wanted to reach clarification. He also knew that he would search the premises once the public interest had died down. Of course, that wouldn't be possible for another day or two, so he had to be patient.

A quiet "pling" announced that the elevator had finally arrived. Lost in thoughts, Rude took a step forward into the small room and watched the doors close behind him. That night, a somber atmosphere seemed to engulf the company headquarters. Most employees had not yet come to work and, therefore, the hallways were silent and dark. Yet it was strangely soothing to be there. The headquarters felt safe in that it was unchanged.

He left the elevator on one of the upper stories. The lights were dimmed, but not turned off – never turned off – and through one of the very few windows the headquarters had to offer, the sickly green glow of the city below flooded the place. Rude stopped for a moment and, for the first time since he had become a Turk, took off his sunglasses at the workplace. Normally, he liked how surreal and distorted the world looked through these dark glasses, but today, he wanted to see it. He wanted to see the monstrous organism by the name of _Midgar_ live.

~tbc~


	7. Chapter 6

" _Damn it, Laney! That ain't fair!"_

" _Oh, but it is, dear. It's your own fault, you know. Not doing any paperwork for weeks on end means that, sooner or later, you'll have to pull an all-nighter."_

" _Yeah, but … How come there's that much of this shit? Does it reproduce at night after you close the drawers? By the time I'm done with it, I'm gonna be old and grey. You can't do this to me!"_

" _Oh, but I can. It's your own fault for leaving all this shit untouched for so long. I refuse to be held responsible for your_ _awe-inspiring_ _laziness. If anything, you should take the matter up with Tseng, though he's not at fault either."_

 _Amusedly, Rude smiled to himself. He stood a few meters away from his colleagues, a coffee-cup in hand, and had let his gaze wander over the city which seemed even duller and more inhospitable that early in the morning than it usually did, when the not really hostile argument broke his train of thoughts._

 _A short time ago, Reno had arrived at headquarters and made the mistake not to disappear in the cafeteria immediately as per usual, which was why Elena had been able to corner him right in front of Tseng's office with a pile of forms and files in hand that – judging from their argument – were Reno's responsibility and in desperate need of attention. She had instantly thrown the documents at him in order to prevent him from escaping. It seriously looked like a lot of work._

" _And how the fuck is that my fault?" Reno grumbled surly. "I didn't have time for shit like that recently. It's as simple as that."_

" _Oh?" Elena retorted with a rather smug grin. "So you didn't have the time? Pretty standard for an excuse, don't you think? I wonder what you have been doing … And what ever made you think that matters? It's not like we ever have time to spare. Just for how long do you intend to ignore your paperwork? Until it comes alive and does itself?"_

 _Reno pulled a disgusted face and chewed indecisively on his lower lip. Knowing his partner, Rude assumed that he'd have liked to do just that._

" _Well, aren't you a model Second in Command," Elena chastised. "Sometimes I can't help but wonder how the hell you ever got the job. You don't have any self-discipline whatsoever."_

" _Laney, that's low!"_

 _She gave a cheerful giggle. "Maybe. Why don't you prove me wrong if it bothers you so much?"_

 _Reno snorted disapprovingly, but bowed to the inevitable under a string of silent curses. Disgruntled and without so much as sparing her a second glance, he dropped the papers on his desk and joined Rude at his vantage point._

" _Hiya, partner!" he greeted without vigor and without his obligatory good morning-grin. "Looks like I'll have to honor the bureau with my presence for a while longer than I'd like to."_

"…"

" _Talkative as ever, I can see." And there was the grin. Delayed, but still in place. "How late is it anyway? It should be time to leave soon."_

" _You just want to get out of work!" Elena, who had followed him without being asked to, stated matter-of-factly. And rightly so._

 _Rude rolled up his sleeves to let his partner have a look at his wristwatch regardless. It was a quarter past six._

" _Well, fuck," Reno commented drily._

 _Laughing, Elena gave him a pat on the shoulder. "Tough luck!" she declared with glee. "Looks like you still have a couple of hours left to spare."_

"…" _Rude said. His eyes conveyed his unconditional assent._

" _What's_ wrong _with you?!" Reno complained and eyed them with all the consternation of a kicked puppy. It didn't have the hoped-for effect. "Are you conspiring against me or what? You're both heartless, that is what you are!" The look on his face alone was so excessively theatrical that Rude wouldn't have been surprised if he had stalked over to his desk, thrown the papers to the floor and torn his hair._

 _Unfortunately, he didn't have the time to continue watching this highly amusing spectacle – he had an appointment with Tseng at half past and punctuality was common courtesy on the executive floor. Wordlessly, he thrust his coffee-cup into Elena's hand and turned to leave without sparing his discontented partner another glance. After all, he didn't pity him too much._

" _I'm off," he informed them briefly, raised his hand to bid his farewell, and left._

" _Eh?" Reno stared after his partner uncomprehendingly. "Where's he going?"_

 _Elena shrugged indifferently. "Tseng called for him," she explained. "Most likely to discuss the details of your mission later."_

" _What?" Reno frowned indignantly. "Then why in Odin's name didn't he call me up as well? That concerns me as much as it does Rude!"_

" _It must be because you, my dear, have other fish to fry," she coldly reminded him, pointing to the Mount Nibel of files piled up on his desk. "You don't have time for a briefing with that amount of untouched papers waiting. C'mon, let's get on with it! Let's get this party started!"_

" _Are you nuts?" Reno hissed, close to being honestly pissed off now. "Where do you think we are? At the annual meeting of the society of dedicated deskjockies? Kindly stop jerking me around!"_

" _Are you nuts?"_

* * *

 _XXX_

* * *

Elena heaved a sigh. In all probability, she was. How else could be explained that she was driving despite her considerably high blood alcohol level and despite it being the middle of the night? She had to have a screw loose somewhere.

To distract herself, she switched on the radio and listened to the umpteenth rerun of a corny audio drama with half an ear. It took her a while to realize it was _Loveless_. Under normal circumstances, she would have turned it off instantly for all the irksome memories it brought up, but right now she craved the background noise.

She was glad that Rude had not accompanied her home. He would have discouraged her from going through with her plan at all costs, but if she didn't see this through, she would explode. She knew well enough that it was anything but a good idea to go and visit Tseng right now, but she knew just as well she wouldn't find a moment's rest until she had exchanged at least two decent words with him. She was so damned angry with him! How could he not have listened to her? No matter how big the trouble she'd be in tomorrow, she had to confront him. Now.

If only she hadn't drunk so much …

* * *

XXX

* * *

" _There, there," she put him off with a placating gesture. "I'm not – ahem – 'jerking you around'. You do yourself no service, though, if you don't get to work soon."_

 _Reno answered her well-meant advice with a growl, but decided to heed it anyway. He had long since learned that not wanting to do something was no valid excuse in this environment. He wouldn't have climbed that far up the career ladder if he didn't. Unmotivated beyond belief, he started sorting the papers first by date, then by importance._

 _Elena smiled at him encouragingly and left him alone with the Herculean task, pointedly closing the door of their newly shared office behind her. Reno almost didn't notice her departure._

 _He felt slightly lost behind the paper peaks of virgin files. These last days, his mood had persevered a little above zero, but this was just too much. If there were gods in this world, they obviously had it in for him. If his private life didn't even live up to normal standards of crappiness, then couldn't he at least expect his job to be bearable?_

 _A more philosophically inclined man than him might have argued that his misfortune was only natural, seeing that he had single-handedly brought worse fates down on the heads of hundreds of innocent people, but Reno refused to accept punishment for sins he'd committed in other people's names. Maybe, though, that was the problem. If all he did was acting as a mechanical arm for the company, could he really expect to be treated like a living, breathing human being? If he did not take responsibility, how could he expect somebody else to feel responsible for what they did to him?_

 _He felt a lot like banging his head against the wall. What he was thinking didn't even make sense to him. It was a joke. He didn't feel particularly sorry for what he'd done; he just felt sorry for himself, and that needed to stop. He should be old enough by now to understand that the planet wasn't there to please him exclusively._

" _Reno, damn it!"_

 _Startled, he actually knocked over one of the half-sorted piles and could only watch the papers scatter all over the floor. He hadn't expected Elena to come back so soon and catch him spacing out. Sometimes, a rabid dog seemed harmless in comparison to her._

" _Oh shit," he assessed the situation quite accurately._

" _You don't say," office-watchdog Elena retorted coldly. "How often do I have to tell you? Get your ass in gear and do your job! How can Tseng rely on you if you're like that? Really, sometimes you are such a brat!"_

 _Her posture and her tone of voice informed him that what had originally started off as a friendly squabble had suddenly morphed into something else. She wouldn't have dared to talk to him with that much venom only days ago, because – even if he was behind with all that cursed paperwork – he was still her superior. Reno wasn't sure what had changed since then. All he knew was that it had to do with this one magic name: Tseng. Tseng must have said something to her recently, he suddenly realized, and it filled him with a sickening mixture of pity, rage, and fear. He didn't really want to think about Tseng now. The day sucked badly enough already._

" _Don't sweat it, I'm on it," he tried to calm her down, even though, deep down, he felt outraged at letting her walk all over him. It wouldn't serve any purpose to talk back now. They'd only fight, and sooner or later the root of the problem would be uncovered. He didn't want that. It would hurt them both. Better to play dumb and back down. "Until you arrived, this shit was almost sorted."_

 _He pointed at the mess on the floor and glared at her. It was safe to fight about the paperwork. From that, they could easily recover._

 _Elena's expression became blank. "I'm_ terribly _sorry," she said, sounding so disgustingly uncaring that he wanted to hit her. This was still within the limits of his comfort zone, though. He could deal with it. "In that case, please don't let me keep you from 'working'. I'll be as quiet as your phone. You know, when someone tries to call you after work."_

 _He ignored the jab. It was something Tseng liked to reproach him for, even though it hardly ever happened. The last time his phone had been turned off was when he'd forgotten to recharge the battery, because … Oh. He swallowed a sudden surge of bright, hot anger. What exactly Tseng had done, he couldn't tell, but there could no longer be any doubt that he'd let Elena in on their secret without ever asking his opinion or even informing him of his actions. So that was why she came at him like a fury because of something as trivial as neglected paperwork._

 _Was this Tseng putting them both back into their places?_

 _It was an asshole move reminding them of who was boss around here, and Reno hated that kind of behavior with a passion. Recently, it had become much more frequent and only Gaia knew why. It had been bad enough when Tseng had only been a workaholic, but now this boss thing had become something akin to a raincoat: everything dripped off of it and he just couldn't get through._

" _Reno!" Elena hissed and he understood that he'd have to stop spacing out for now if he didn't want this thing between them to escalate after all. Fuming with suppressed rage, he started picking up the files._

~tbc~

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 **Author's note:** I apologize for not updating sooner. From now on, chapters will be more frequent, I promise. As you've probably realized by now, this is kind of an AU as it doesn't fit the game's timeline at all. I just borrowed characters, places, and institutions I wanted to have in this story ... Maybe I should also warn you that there will be quite some violence occuring later on. Thanks for reading! I hope you still enjoy this and will continue to do so. :-)


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